What do you think?

My friend Kara took these adorable pictures of the babies. I need help choosing the best ones! What do you think? These are just a few, there are tons that I haven't gone through yet so I'll be posting more but these are some of the favorites!

The many faces of Morgan

It's next to impossible to get a serious picture of Morg's. She's such a nut and always pulling some funny face so this is my latest attempt. She was seriously just about wetting her pants and had me doing the same after a few shots. Enjoy!

pic #1 (okay, I can do this) pic #2 (I'm TRYING) pic #3 (never mind, I can't)

pic #4 (mom, I'm going to wet my pants) pic #5 (okay, I'm ready....big sigh)
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Personality plus! I love you Morgan, you are beautiful inside and out and I think you are pretty amazing!

The joys of teething

Poor little man, need I say more?


He's cutting two bottom teeth and is just plain miserable! Can't wait until my happy little man returns but until then, I'll smother him in loves and kisses!

Pretty Girl!

Regan is one happy girl; she got her first "official" babysitting job on Thursday night. She, of course, has baby sat for us plenty of times and watched the neighbor kids while they were sleeping, but, this was different. She watched 3 kids under the ages of 5 for 2 hours. Her end of the phone conversation the day she was asked went something like this: "me, are you serious, Really?? I would LOVE to!! That sounds great!! Can you just hear her? It was so cute! She really needed a self esteem boost and I think this did it. She got along just great and was able to earn some money, although, I don't even think the money had anything to do with the excitement......I'll savor that while it lasts. She is a great kid, super responsible for a 10 year old and growing up way too fast for my liking! BUT, I'm pretty sure she'll never out grow the great hugs she so freely gives. I love you, Regan....don't ever forget it!

Tender mercies

I needed one! I fell asleep mid-sentence while reading to Jordy, she quietly snuck away to draw and let me take a much needed 10 minute power nap while babies and Kaleb napped. I woke up to the sweet sound of baby chatter....Porter and Kamryn carrying on their own conversation in their bedroom, went in to find them both standing up in their cribs giggling at one another. (both with stinky diapers) Just made me smile!

Random thoughts!

I'm just plain tired! I can't believe I actually have 6 children...am I really THAT old?? I always get the funniest looks when I'm out shopping with the 4 younger kids. People stop me all the time and make comments like, "man, you really have YOUR hands full," or my personal favorite, "you poor thing," and "are they really ALL yours, you don't look old enough," oh how I want to give those people a huge hug. I feel really overwhelmed with life right now, chasing babies, homework, activities, piano, sick kids, etc. etc., and people tell me it only gets busier. I find it hard to believe. I am plenty busy! I don't know where I'm going with this, it's just the way I've been feeling for a while now and I'm sure when kids get better, school's out for the summer, babies are a bit older, I might feel a little more "in control," but then again, maybe not. But, after a long, hard, days work, I still wouldn't give a one of them back!

Sleepover fun!

Grandma Rose had the girls down for a High School Musical 3 movie party and sleep over Friday night. They have been looking forward to this for a few weeks now and, believe me, they weren't dissapointed. Here were some of the favorites from the weekend:

* Regan- "We got to stay up until 11:30, oh and the movie was great too."

* Morgan- "I got to play alone with Katy (cousin) for a long time, w/out Jordyn"

* Jordyn- "We had fruit kabobs and the yummiest breakfast ever"

They all loved the makeup and nail party, the taco salad picnic outside, playing in their favorite park, eating yummy snacks, playing dress up, hanging out with Grandma and their cousin, Kate, and also spending some time with Grandpa.

Grandpa saved the day and came to have a sleepover with Kaleb at our house. They ate popcorn, orange julius, and no bake cookies and stayed up late watching "Shrek." Kaleb woke up at 6:00 sharp talking Grandpa's ear off downstairs. They snuggled and read books for awhile and then had breakfast and ended the fun with a viewing of "Bob the Builder." Thanks to dad for enduring to the end. I only took one picture of the fun but it's a cute one.

For the record: this isn't Kaleb's bedroom, they had to snuggle in a bigger bed so they moved to Jordyn and Morgan's bed.

Numbers

The babies had their 9 month well-baby checks yesterday. It's crazy but they are still almost 2 lbs. apart. Porter weighed in at 19 lbs. 5 oz. and Kamryn weighed in at 17 lbs. 7 oz. I felt a little bad because it turns out that Kamryn had a pretty bad infection in her left ear. So, now we have 2 bottles of pink medicine, also known as the diarrhea inducer. I honestly don't know which is worse, the ear infection, or the diarrhea that comes along with the medicine. The past couple of weeks, I've been up to my elbows in poop changing way too many "blow out" diapers. You all know the kind, right?? Other than the ear thing, they both checked out great. They are both pulling themselves up to everything and getting in to anything that is in their path. I think they have the "divide and conquer" thing down because I'm having a hard time knowing which one to run after. I know what you are thinking, "it's only going to get worse," and you are right!!

Once again, good thing they are so darn cute!!

I ended up taking Kaleb in to the doctor along with the twins because he spiked another fever on Sunday and is still not feeling well. He keeps getting random fevers for a day or two at a time and then he's mysteriously fine the next day. This has been going on for a good month and I feel so bad for the little guy. The doctor did a strep test which was negative, couldn't find anything wrong with his ears, throat, etc. so they sent me over to the hospital lab for some urine and blood samples just to see if we can get some answers so hopefully we'll know more soon.

In between the visit to the doctor and the visit to the hospital we ran over to see a sister in our ward that is in the Care Center. She looks so much worse than she did a week ago when we were there and things don't look good. The kids love to visit her but I think it was hard on them this time because of her poor condition, Kaleb and Jordyn haven't stopped talking about "poor Lily." I got the babies out of their carseats so she could see them because I figured, babies can make anyone smile and we got a little response from her. Anyway, I've had a hard time lately because we have several families in our ward that are dealing with major health concerns. I struggle between feeling so very grateful for good health but at the same time feel very sad and guilty that they are the ones going through such huge trials. We have a sister in our ward, whom I love dearly, battling with brain cancer. She has two of the cutest girls around Regan and Morgan's age so I can only imagine what she and those girls go through not knowing what the future holds. Also, we have another family with 3 out of their 5 children diagnosed with a form of Leaukemia. Can you even imagine??? They are such strong people and have a great amount of faith! What a great example they are to me.

Fire Station Field Trip

Cute kids!

Kaleb thought the ambulance was pretty neat!

I love the kids faces!

Jordyn & McKenna in the firetruck

"Give me a high-five, Jordyn"

I was in charge of the preschool field trip today so I decided on our downtown Fire Station. We have several in town but I love this station because of the fire pole. (oh, the firefighters are pretty fun too.) I got a kick out of watching their faces when the guy slid down the pole. Jordyn and Kaleb thoroughly enjoyed themselves, they've been talking about it for weeks so it was a big day. Kaleb was a little freaked out by the big trucks at first but it didn't take him long to warm up.

kid creations

My kids love to sit and color, draw, paint, craft, etc., so naturally we go through a ton of paper and though I love all their creations, I can't possibly save every thing they make so I'm hoping they will be okay with my new way of artwork preservation. For the record, I do save some of their favorites in their scrapbooks but the rest mysteriously disappears in the trash after a short stay on the fridge door.

By Jordyn (5) She particularly loves to draw people!

By Morgan (6): I'm hoping this means she's super excited for soccer to start! I think she did this one during church. Oops, at least she was being quiet!

By Regan (10): This is Regan's latest school creation. She loves any kind of craft project which I used to be so good at doing with the kids but since the twins came along, a lot of the craft creations have come to a hault. Sorry kids, be patient with me!

Happy Birthday, Wendy!

Okay, my sister's friend, Wendy, is having a birthday, (don't know her) but thought I'd wish her a Happy Birthday and let you know she's having a giveaway to celebrate the big "31." It's a really good one, I think you'll agree so hop on over and enter. Oh, mention I sent you! Thanks and good luck!

Back in the saddle!

The past week has been a little nuts with sick kids so I've just been doing the bear necessities which doesn't include blogging. Today I finally took Porter in to the Dr. and found out that he has an ear infection, which explains his fussiness and bad sleeping habits the past few nights. Hopefully the medicine will kick in quickly so he'll return to his happy little self.

Yesterday, I took Jordyn to kindergarten round up where she got to have a little reading readiness test and tour of her future classroom. She had perma-grin the whole morning, I got the biggest kick out of watching her facial expressions while walking through the school. She's so ready to go and won't be a bit homesick. In fact, I think she'll cry when her teacher tells her it's time to go home for the day!!!

Thanks to a little motivation from my sister, I've been getting up every morning with the kids to exercise. I can't believe how hard it is to drag myself out of bed in the morning, but the kids diligently wake me up each morning and keep me going. For one of our Enrichment activities this year we're doing a 12 week fitness challenge where the ladies meet at the church 3 times a week to exercise. We're fortunate enough to have a talented lady that works at a fitness club here in town to be our leader so it is a great workout! It's nice because I get new ideas each week to do with the kids besides using the cans out of our storage room for weights. Anyway, this morning I was sleeping on the couch at 5:55 when I had the creepy feeling that someone was watching me, sure enough it was Regan standing there waiting for me to wake up. If only she knew how precious 5 minutes are in my life right now. Anyway, the stretching and exercising has lessened my back pain quite a bit and it's fun to visit with the kids for a few minutes in the morning before the craziness starts.

Last week I caught Porter steeling food off of Kamryn's tray and the "what did I do wrong" look on his face made me laugh out loud.

(pic 1)"Mr. Innocent" (pic 2) "Mr. Sly pants" (pic 3) "I can't help myself," I love Kamryn's face in the last picture. She knows he's been caught!

This is Kamryn's latest cheesy grin! Somewhere in my picture archives I have a very similar pose of Regan holding Kaleb at this very same age. Regan has sure grown up and still as pretty as ever. Porter looks so much like Kaleb it's crazy!

A quick snapshot before church at 9:00! Yes, we are on time!

Sunday we made a bunch of goodies and went around to visit some people in our ward. It's a good way of passing a very long afternoon and secretly my way of getting out of listening to kids fight all afternoon. In the evening we got to go with DJ to the Visitors Center to see the Sister Missionaries. While we were there we got to view their newest video "Kirtland" that had just arrived the day before. It's only about 20 minutes and the kids were completely entertained!

After the movie we wandered around and enjoyed all the little interactive stations, Kaleb was so excited to see the "big Jesus" (the statue of Jesus). He was a little hyper the whole evening so we were in and out in a little over an hour.

Little cuties

Holy Cow, I can't believe it's already March, the babies are almost 9 months old and Spring is hopefully on its way! Kamryn and Porter are both very mobile now, Porter started crawling about a week ago and took his first dive down the stairs. Where was I??? I stepped out of the room for a second, and I guess he thought he'd follow me. Man, I felt so bad, now both babies have taken a spill and hopefully learned their lesson...but probably not. Anyway, they have both been sick for a while with this nasty flu that is going around. Their little noses have run constantly so, therefore, our house feels like one big yucky germ. Yesterday they were fussy and clingy and just want to be held and to top it all off, Kaleb started feeling sick after lunch and was burning up with a fever for a few hours but he seems better today. Poor kids, this is Kaleb's 2nd go around with it, hopefully it's short lived. Anyway, thought I'd share a few adorable pics of the little people. Kaleb loves to put his cowboy hat on Porter so they can be twins. On a daily basis he says, "Porter is my best buddy, he can't take naps anymore."

You can tell how rotten Kamryn was feeling in the polka dot jammy picture, her eyes tell the whole story!

Yummy, saltine cracker druel! I love that they can feed themselves occasionally, especially when I'm fixing dinner!

We love our daddy!

A confession!

It's rather embarrassing to say that I've never learned to french braid hair, yes, you heard me right, I CAN'T FRENCH BRAID!! (until now) I do have 4 girls and I've just about done everything with their hair BUT french braids. Sooooo, after a very long time of standing in line at the grocery store, I glanced over to see a cute hair do on Jennifer Aniston in a magazine (loved the hair, not the girl) anyway, she had a cute french braid in the front section of her hair and then the rest was down. I loved it and decided that I better learn to french braid. Guess what??? I can finally do it, I'm so proud of myself......I know, it's sad what I get excited about these days but it's been so much fun doing the kids hair. Soooo, yesterday the girls wanted me to play with them after church so we (or should I say "I") suggested their 2 barbie heads and we went to town french braiding the hair. Then, I moved on to Jordyn, she was the lucky girl to sit patiently while her mother yanked, combed, parted, and sprayed her hair and after a little while she had 3 pretty descent braids in her hair. Now, my favorite past time is checking out cute hairstyle blogs and trying new things. Send any ideas my way, please!!